Western University Scholarship@Western Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository 4-12-2016 12:00 AM The Real Housewives of Ancient Rome: Evidence for the Economic Contributions of Women Sarah M. VanderPloeg The University of Western Ontario Supervisor Elizabeth Greene The University of Western Ontario Graduate Program in Classics A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree in Master of Arts © Sarah M. VanderPloeg 2016 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd Part of the Classical Archaeology and Art History Commons Recommended Citation VanderPloeg, Sarah M., "The Real Housewives of Ancient Rome: Evidence for the Economic Contributions of Women" (2016). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 3735. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/3735 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Abstract The involvement of women in commerce has been a common feature of most economies. However, Roman authors tend to obscure the function of women within the Roman economy. This thesis seeks not only to understand the roles women played in commerce in ancient Rome but also the impact that their social status had on their ability to contribute in a meaningful way to the economy. Epigraphic and literary evidence is drawn on to provide a complete understanding of the roles women played. It is apparent that social status affected the way a female was able to interact with the economic culture of Roman society. Elite women were much more restricted in their ability to gain financial success than middle or working class women. Ideological expectations for women in Roman society were often upheld in order to preserve family prestige. Non-elite women had also internalized these traditions but were financially unable to abide by them and so they were often represented in commemorative inscriptions and reliefs engaging with the Roman workforce. Keywords Roman women, gender identity, social identity, economy, epigraphy, Roman literature, working women, class structures Acknowledgments I offer my sincerest thanks to my supervisor Elizabeth Greene for her unfailing positivity and encouragement throughout this project as well as for all her guidance throughout my undergraduate and graduate degrees. I am also grateful to my board of examiners: Alex Meyer, Kelly Olson, and Laurel Shire for their corrections and advice. Everyone’s suggestions helped make this project the best it could be. I am especially thankful to my mother, Marian, for teaching me the importance of finding humour in every situation no matter how stressful, and my father, Roger, for teaching me the value of hard work and instilling in me the work ethic that has allowed me to complete this thesis. ii Table of Contents Abstract ................................................................................................................................ i Acknowledgments............................................................................................................... ii Table of Contents ............................................................................................................... iii Chapter 1 ............................................................................................................................. 1 1 Introduction and Literature Review ................................................................................ 1 1.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................. 1 1.2 Literature Review.................................................................................................... 4 1.2.1 Scholarship Focused on Gender.................................................................. 4 1.2.2 How can we access ancient gender? ......................................................... 22 Chapter 2 ........................................................................................................................... 28 2 Roman Attitudes Concerning Work ............................................................................. 28 2.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................... 28 2.2 Women’s Legal Rights ......................................................................................... 32 2.3 Ancient Attitudes Regarding Occupations............................................................ 36 2.4 Understanding Status from Occupational Inscriptions ...................................... 40 2.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 44 Chapter 3 ........................................................................................................................... 46 3 Elite Roman Women in the Economy .......................................................................... 46 3.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................... 46 3.2 Elite Women in Trade ........................................................................................... 47 3.3 Female Munificence.............................................................................................. 51 3.4 Women Dispensing Loans, Favours, and Investments ....................................... 60 3.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 63 Chapter 4 ........................................................................................................................... 66 iii 4 Non-Elite Roman Businesswomen .............................................................................. 66 4.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................... 66 4.2 Women in Manufacture and Commerce ............................................................... 70 4.3 Women in the Textile Industry ............................................................................. 76 4.4 Rural Labour in the Ancient World ...................................................................... 80 4.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 84 Chapter 5 ........................................................................................................................... 87 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................ 87 Bibliography ..................................................................................................................... 93 Curriculum Vitae .............................................................................................................. 98 iv Chapter 1 Introduction and Literature Review 1.1 Introduction For most of the history of classical scholarship, attention has primarily been paid to those stories of the great and famous men of antiquity and their battles. It is only within the last forty or so years that scholars have begun to consider seriously the place in history for women and marginalized groups of both sexes such as slaves and the poor. Slowly, gender and social status were realized as important facets of society and by ignoring these two aspects of antiquity, scholars would never fully understand ancient society. In large part, the early focus on the masculine aspects of society was due to the social customs that predominantly allowed men to practice in academic fields. The shift scholarship undertook towards a more comprehensive understanding of antiquity was due to the revolutionary changes modern society experienced throughout the early twentieth century and perhaps more importantly only within the last few decades. Despite the necessity that likely would have demanded that many women undertake work beyond their domestic duties to allow the household to be financially sustainable, scholars have largely ignored women’s work until recently.1 This thesis seeks to understand the variety of ways women contributed to the socioeconomic culture of 1 For example Bradley 1991; Dixon 1990, 2001a, 2001b, 2004; D’Ambra 2007; Gardner 1986, 1988, 1999; Hemelrijk 2012, 2015; Joshel 1992; Kampen 1981; Scheidel 1995, 1996, 2012; Treggiari 1976. 1 Roman society.2 Not only does it undertake this task, but this thesis also examines the constraints social status placed on a woman’s ability to function within Roman commercial life. Chapter two situates Roman women in the context of ancient attitudes towards occupations. More specifically, it details what sources modern scholars have available to them concerning ancient attitudes and how this has led to an imbalance in modern understanding surrounding women’s place in ancient economic life. Literary sources were composed by aristocratic male writers, who were in the unique position of not typically being required to undertake daily menial tasks in order to sustain their families and lifestyle. Thus, chapter two reveals the stigma surrounding certain types of labour should not necessarily be understood as representing the general Roman population’s opinions towards various types of occupations.